


Welcome to Hawkins

by Highsmith (quimtessence)



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Episode: s02e02 Trick or Treat Freak, Gen, Halloween, Missing Scene, Season/Series 02, Trick or Treat: Extra Treat, Trick or Treat: Trick, Unsettling
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-08
Updated: 2019-11-08
Packaged: 2021-01-24 23:24:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 336
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21346501
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/quimtessence/pseuds/Highsmith
Summary: Max's first Halloween in Hawkins.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 8
Collections: Trick or Treat Exchange 2019





	Welcome to Hawkins

**Author's Note:**

  * For [darlingargents](https://archiveofourown.org/users/darlingargents/gifts).

> This was technically finished in time for Halloween, but then life stuff came up. Sorry.

Halloween in Hawkins is unlike anything Max has ever experienced before.

It's not that they don't have all the same shit in California, like dressing up and candy and cheesy paper decorations strewn through the entire town. It's not even that it's, like, a completely different season—much colder than what Max is used to for October. If it were just that, it would be easy to explain away. It's more a general vibe around the town, as if there's an anticipation beneath everything, not of anything clearly defined as either good or bad, or even indifferently neutral, but more as if everyone and everything is holding its breath, waiting out a storm Max fails to see coming.

There's probably loads of things she doesn't quite see. She's not scared to ask as such, because that's just plain silly, though there's a weird tension within her limbs whenever she starts thinking she might ask and then someone might just tell her. As if whatever it is (it's silly, she hasn't even asked, what the fuck) should not be told, but that's something definitely weird. She's being weird here.

So she decides she might as well ask. The words _What could possibly happen?_ flicker at the front of her mind for only an instant before they extinguish themselves. She doesn't want to think about _that_, all of a sudden.

The best thing would be to tell someone. She could tell the guys. She could joke around and play it off, and then they'll say it's nonsense, and then she'll pretend to be sort of offended or some shit, but then it'll be all fine and dandy. All perfectly fine.

She could totally do that.

She doesn't. She doesn't say anything at all, just continues walking from house to house, vaguely aimless, vaguely concerned for no reason. (Vaguely scared? What for?)

Her first Halloween in Hawkins, Indiana. She hopes it's going to be a good one. Or at least not boring.

It would suck if it were boring.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm [rhubarbdreams @ tumblr](https://rhubarbdreams.tumblr.com/) if you want to share in my obsessions.


End file.
